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Survey of nanotcnological consumer products

1 Introduction to survey of nanotechnological consumer products

• 1.1 What is nanotechnology?
• 1.2 The consumer market for nanotechnological products
• 1.3 Legislation in brief
• 1.4 Categorization
• 1.5 Objective and reading instructions

1.1 What is nanotechnology?

It takes 1 million nanometre (nm) to equal 1 millimetre, and nanotechnology is based on controlled processes effective from approx. 0.1 nm to 100 m. The new technology is a so called ‘enabling technology’ and will form the foundation of many other new technologies and products within the areas of materials science, environment and health. Almost all industrialized countries including India, China are making huge investments in nanotechnological research (COM, 2004). Also in Denmark research and development within nanotechnology is expanding rapidly. Publications and electronic media often report fantastic possibilities of revolutionary treatment of diseases with nano knives, nano measuring instruments in the bloodstream or fixed in the packaging of foodstuffs, surface treated materials that never require cleaning, windows with built-in invisible Venetian blinds, etc. etc.

Many of these ‘nano visions’ will only perhaps come true, but it is certain that the technical possibilities do exist. With this new technology we can develop materials, in which the placing of each individual atom and molecule is controlled. Generally, it means that a product based on the reactions of chemical substances is working much more precisely and effectively in a nano-shape than in a product based on traditional chemistry (Davis 2005). This means that it is much easier controlled to design the properties of a chemical substance, and for instance the developers are far ahead with nanoparticles that are a temperature sensitive chemical indicator or that show a colour code by contact with Salmonella in foodstuffs.

Styregruppen for Teknologisk Fremsyn (The Steering Group of Technological Foresight in Denmark) defined in 2004 nanotechnology as: “The ability to work on the atomar, molecular and supramolecular level on a scale from 0.1 to 100 nm to design, produce, manipulate and apply materials, components and systems with new physical chemicals and biological functional properties. These new properties appear due to the small scale of the structure, and cannot be acquired in any other way”.

Nanoparticles as a product of nanotechnology were defined by Oberdörster et al. (2005) as “a particle constructed or produced by humans in nanoscale with specific physiochemical composition and structure to make use of properties and functions related to these dimensions”.

As nanoparticles intuitively are considered as a terminated more or less spatial entity, it is difficult to relate the expression to surface treatments, tubes and fibres. Consequently, we have in this report chosen to use the expression nanomaterials about nanotechnologically produced products generally. The expression nanotechnology is used about the processes behind. The designation ‘Nanoparticles’ is used about nanomaterials with particle character.

1.2 The consumer market for nanotechnological products

The path from development to product or from research to invoice may be short when speaking about nanotechnology. Every year, the web magazine, Nanotech Briefs, nominates the 50 most interesting nanotechnologies- products, -and developers (NASA 2006) of the year. Even if these leading edge products have only been known for some months, surface treatments and sports equipment are found in the consumer market. The great bustle is the USA (Woodrow Willson Centre 2006) and Asia (Nano Frum 2006), but also in the EU the market for consumer products based on a nanotechnological platform is prosperous.

For several years, the magazine Forbes has nominated the product with the greatest potential among the consumer products based on nanotechnology. The below table shows the latest nominated, and it is clear that the commentator Josh Wolfe, who prepares the list often chooses correct – both iPod, cosmetics, sporting goods, textiles, paint and windshield treatment are marketed and sold because of their nanotechnological properties.

Table 1: Top 10 consumer products based on nanotechnology from Forbes (2006)

Nanotechnology is not attached to particular productions or types of products and it is often emphasized that the technology can be applied in almost all possible trades and products as an enabling technology. However, the main part of the consumer products seems to be cosmetics, a number of products for different surface treatments and sporting goods.

For many years, companies within cosmetics and “health care” have come very far with their product development and it is assumed that this type of consumer products will be marketed considerably during the coming 5-10 year. In addition, it is expected that areas in line with the consumer products, such as medical devices and implants, veterinary and human pharmaceuticals as well as biocides/pesticides will be deeply affected by the nanotechnology during the same period. (Luther 2004). They are fields of application that also influence humans direct or indirectly. Some of the products will also find their way to the market as consumer products as is the case with band aid containing nano-crystalline silver.

1.3 Legislation in brief

The chemicals legislation specifies a number of demands for classification and labelling of existing chemical substances based on the effects to man and the environment. Generally, the triviality limit for classification is 0.1%, indicated as the content of the chemical substance in the product. Under this limit there is no demand for classification and labelling of chemical substances regardless of toxicity (with few exceptions). Existing nano-sized substances will be classified and labelled as the corresponding substance in bulk form, despite of its different characteristics.

Introduction of a new chemical to the European market requires specific documentation depending on the application and quantity of the produced/imported chemical. If a nano-sized chemical is a new chemical substance, the existing notification procedure for new chemical substances^[1] will apply.

In the REACH legislation, the lowest tonnage limit for registration is 1 tonne per producer or importer per year both for existing substances and new chemical substances.

The cosmetic products are covered by a specific legislation, where an assessment of the substances is carried out by the European Commission’s Scientific Committee on Consumer Products (SCCP) before a regulation is decided. SCCP has compiled and used information on particles in the nanosize range in the assessment of titanium dioxide and zinc oxide as UV-filters in sun lotion^[2].

Basically, it is the producer or the importer of a cosmetic product who has the responsibility only to market products safe for consumer’s health. Their assessment must be documented by a dossier available to the authorities (DEPA). For cosmetic products the regulation also stipulates that ingredients must be declared on the product.

The product safety legislation is a consumer protection legislation to ensure only products that are not dangerous are marketed. When marketing a product the origin and name and address of the previous link in the product chain must be documented. If producers and distributors know that a product marketed by them is risk-bearing to the consumer they must at once advise the control authorities with information about the measures taken to prevent the risks to the consumers. In principle, the legislation for product safety should comprise all safety aspects connected to possible nanoproducts that are not comprised by other special legislation.

1.4 Categorization

The survey collected information on the products sold by the individual companies and on the quantity sold in the Danish market. In addition and if possible also information on the product composition as well as the percentage share of the ingredients in the product will be collected. To obtain a systematized survey, various products containing nanoparticles and nanotechnology will be divided and categorized in the following product types concurrently with identification of them.

I a.            Solid substance with nanostructure in one phase

I b.           Solid substance with nanostructure in several

                 phases

II a.          Materials with nanostructure surfaces

II b.          Film of nanometer thickness

II c.          Nanostructured films

III a.         Surface-bound nanoparticles

III b.        Nanoparticles suspended in liquids

III c.         Nanoparticles suspended in solids

III d.        Airborne nanoparticles

This categorization of nanomaterials is based on developmental work made by DTU (Hansen et al., 2007). The basic method in the survey is to describe human exposure to nanomaterials in products by: 1) nanomaterials are characterized by means of a categorization developed by DTU, 2) The categorization is linked to the use of the product and 3) typical exposure by normal use.

When categorizing the products in the American edition of the Woodrow Wilson database they are divided as follows:  2, 10 and 75 % in the categories bulk (I), surface (II) and particle (III). A categorization of the remaining products is not possible.

Consumer products may very well fall under to different categories during its cycle of life. As an example, a product for surface treatment of bathroom tiles will typically be sold as a liquid in a bottle, e.g. III b. ‘Nanoparticles suspended in liquids’, but when used on the tiles and forming a new surface, it is categorized in III a. ‘Surface-bound nanoparticles’.

Figure 1 Categorization of nanomaterials based on DTU’s developmental work (Hansen et al., 2007)

Main category I is divided into the sub categories Ia and Ib. The nano-systems of category Ia consist of a single type of material, and the systems of category Ib of two or more ingredients/materials. Examples of systems categorized in Ia is nanocrystalline copper, and the materials in category Ib  include ceramic zeolites which are used as support material in industrial catalysts nanoporous materials, i.e. one on the components in the nanostructure is air.

In category II, the nanostructure is placed on the surface (See Figure 1). Category II can be divided into three subcategories: IIa (structured surface on nanoscale level and surface and solid of the same material); IIb (unstructured nano-thick film on a substrate of another material, e.g. coatings on windows); and IIc (structured film on a substrate with the film being either nano-scale in thickness or the surface structure has nanoscale dimensions.) Many of the reading/writing heads applied on hard disks and lab-on-a-chip systems are categorized under IIc.

Category III contains nanoparticles in free structures, the size of which is nanoscale level in at least two dimensions, which are quantum dots, fullerenes, nanotubes and nanofibres. The subcategories of III have been established in accordance with the carrier vehicle of the nanoparticles. Category IIIa contains nanoparticles bound to the surface of another solid structure, e.g. heterogenous catalysts. Category IIIb comprise systems, in which the nanoparticles have been suspended in a liquid such as titanium dioxide in cosmetics. IIIc is nanoparticles suspended in a solid substance, e.g. carbon tubes in tennis rackets. The last and fourth category, IIId consists of airborne nanoparticles – e.g. free carbon nanotubes or fullerenes, which will probably not appear in consumer products.

1.5 Objective and reading instructions

With reference to the tender of the DEPA, the objective of this project is to prepare a survey of consumer products on the Danish market that contain nanoparticles or are based on nanotechnology and the possible health problems caused by the use of nanoparticles or nanotechnology.

The report contains a survey of the actors on the consumer market followed by a list of the product on the Danish market. In chapter 4 is given a first attempt to calculate the exposure to nanomaterials from different products.

The attachments comprise the methods of the survey, the exposure estimtes and the database on the consumer products.

Consumer products may contain a great number of components, of which some may be produced in a nanotechnological process, e.g. chips in electronics. It has been decided only to focus on products that may cause exposure to the consumer directly via exposure to the nanomaterial in the product.

Attention should be drawn to the fact that the consumer products of the Danish Environmental Protection Agency do not include pesticides or biocides, pharmaceuticals and medical devices, foodstuffs and devices for the manufacture, preparation and storage of foodstuffs.

Footnotes

^[1] Statury Order no. 928 of 19/11/2002

^[2] Titanium dioxide was assessed by the European Commission’s Scientific Committee on Consumer Products (SCCP) to be safe for consumers when used in sunscreens in concentrations up to 25% regardless of the particle size. Zinc oxide is accepted for use as a colouring agent, but it is not allowed for use as a UV filter in cosmetic products.

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Version 1.0 August 2007, © Danish Environmental Protection Agency